USCIS Delays processing NOA1 receipts + payments

“My application was delivered to USCIS over two months ago. I have not gotten any receipt or notice from USCIS acknowledging my case. And the fee payment check I sent with the application has not even been cashed yet? Is my case lost? What is going on?”

The good news is, your case is not lost. It is simply a matter that USCIS is doing an extremely poor job running their mail room.
And this is not happening only with your case, it is happening to everyone’s cases. At the moment applications received as long as 3 months ago,
still have not been opened and entered into processing.

No notice sent, no payment deposited, and one unhappy applicant, needlessly worried about his/her application.

USCIS says the reason for the slowdown is “social distancing”.
That due to Covid restraints they can’t get enough people in the mail room to keep up with the incoming mail.

It’s true that during 2020, primarily April to September, USCIS got much fewer cases than normal.  Perhaps they organized their mailroom structure around the expectation that they would only have 30% of the normal volume of application to process.

But now, beginning around September 2020, things have started to pick up. More couples are finally able to submit their applications.

Well I hope they figure this out, and soon, because I expect there to be a much larger surge in new applications coming soon.
And if USCIS has not been keeping up so far, it’s gonna be bad news for all applicants as their cases will be delayed, and based on the mailroom issue, delayed by easily avoidable issues.

Word to the wise, USCIS treats cases as “first come, first served” so submit your application as early as you can in 2021 cause USCIS will be extremely busy this year. The sooner you get in line, the sooner your case will be completed.

This was Fred Wahl, The VisaCoach